Episode 2: Keith's secret

Chapter 1

A few days passed Black Jack took Jerry under his wing. Since then he trained him and his pokemon in a harsh way, much to the pokemon and Alice's concern.

It was a sunny afternoon in a park of Lilycove City and Black Jack, Alice and Jerry released their respective pokemon to enjoy it, except that Jerry and his pokemon were doing some exercises.

This time, Black Jack had Jerry and his pokemon do one hundred push-ups, with a strict rule that if Jerry or any of his pokemon dropped to the floor, they'd be told to start over… and that was just for a warm up.

As Black Jack often expected, Jerry kept on falling on his front every time he almost got to the target number. "(Something tells me that Jerry likes to do this)," Tyranitar growled to Nidoking, both were observing what was going on.

"(That or Jerry doesn't want to do any other exercises)," Nidoking replied. "(Jerry can't keep on like this forever)."

Black Jack looked at his wristwatch and noticed that this exercise had gone for over an hour. "Okay, Jerry," he called out. "Take ten."

Jerry and his pokemon fell on his belly and panted out heavily, so did his pokemon. "Thanks, boss," Jerry said breathlessly. Recently after Black Jack took Jerry in, Jerry continuously addressed him as the boss. Even though Black Jack didn't like his new nickname, it took him a while to get used to this because Jerry was so dense.

"I'm off to get some food from the drive-thru restaurant for our lunch," Black Jack said as he took his wallet out, handing over some money to Alice. "Alice, you get the usual groceries."

He then turned his attention towards Jerry but to his surprise he had already fallen asleep because of the tiredness from the exercise. "Jerry, you just sleep," Black Jack continued with a frown. "You guys have some rest too."

All of the pokemon present nodded in agreement while Black Jack and Alice walked off in separate directions. While they were gone, Feraligatr couldn't but help but stare at Jerry and Tyranitar noticed it. "(What are you thinking about, Feraligatr?)" the green dinosaur growled.

"(Have you got a marker pen on you?)" Feraligatr growled in a cheeky tone, with a mischievous smile.

"(You never stop, do you?)" Tyranitar growled, knowing what Feraligatr's plan was. "(Too bad, no one has it on them)."

Soon, they noticed a small pink balloon creature with a cute looking face walking down on Jerry. "(A Jigglypuff)?" the two pokemon thought in unison. They then spotted the microphone that the Jigglypuff was holding. Feraligatr grabbed Tyranitar by the shoulder and whispered in his ear.

"(Tyranitar)," Feraligatr growled softly. "(Is this the Jigglypuff that literally puts everyone to sleep with her singing?)"

Tyranitar nodded, signalling a yes to Feraligatr's question. "(And then she scribbles on their faces)," he continued as a sweat drop slowly slid down on the side of his head.

But Ferligatr felt confident as he walked up to the little Jigglypuff, who looked up in a curious way and then became very happy when she saw him. "(Yippee!)" the Jigglypuff cried happily. "(A new audience!)"

Feraligatr face of confidence became a face of shock. "(Wait a minute)!" he snarled. "(I want to ask you a favour)!"

The Jigglypuff became puzzled of what Feraligatr's favour was. "(If you let me borrow your microphone for a minute or so, I'll listen to your singing, okay?)" Feraligatr growled.

"(Okay)," the Jigglypuff replied. "(What kind of favour?)"

Meanwhile, at Alice's location, she entered a grocery store and bought some food and supplies for future travelling. When she came out, she heard a bell ringing loudly and she looked across the road. She saw a bank being robbed as thieves wearing pirate like clothing and masks carrying sacks of cash running towards a getaway car.

One of them spotted Alice observing the scene while the other innocent bystanders ran away in fear. He took a gun out of his gun belt and aimed the weapon at her. "(Oh no)," Alice thought in realisation. "(I have no pokemon on me. Even if I did, I wouldn't risk them)."

The thief shot a bullet out of the gun. As the bullet came inches closer to her, a young teen tackled her down, not only save her from the bullet but he also saved himself.

The thief cursed his bad luck as he quickly got inside the getaway car. As they got away, the young man got up and helped Alice get to her feet. "That was a close one," the teen said.

"Thanks," Alice said. "Although I was going to dodge the bullet myself."

"Not from where I was standing."

Alice looked at the young man in the face and her eyes became widened with surprise. "Hey, wait a minute… Keith?" she asked.

"How… how did you know my name?" Keith asked in a surprised tone.

"It's me… Alice," she replied. "You once saved me from those bullies, remember?"

Keith's eyes became widened as he began to remember.

-Flashback-

A little girl, who had blond hair, a small scar underneath her left eye and was wearing a blue dress, was strolling through a park holding a candy bar when three boys, who were twice her size and were wearing everyday clothing, came round to bully her. "Give us you're candy, kid!" one of the bigger kids yelled.

The little girl was frightened inside but she had the courage to yell out, "no way!"

The bullies began bullying her and snatched the candy bar from her. "Give it back to me!" she cried.

One of the bullies held the candy bar up in the air so that the little girl wouldn't reach it, no matter how high she jumped. She gave up as she fell to her knees and started to cry.

"Give it back to her!" shouted another kid's voice. "Or else!"

The bullies and the little girl turned to the voice's direction and saw a little blond boy who was slightly taller than the girl. The bullies all started laughing at him.

"Or else what?" shouted one of the bullies.

"Or else I will have to take it from you!" the blond boy shouted in replied as he charged towards the three bullies.

"No! Don't!" the girl cried.

The boy took down one of the bullies in a tackle to grab the candy back. But the other bullies retaliated and started stomping on him. Soon all of three of them were stomping on him.

"Did you really think you can beat the three of us, pipsqueak?" shouted one of the bullies.

"Maybe this kid can't, but I can," said a voice. The bullies turned round to see a six-foot ten, bearded man wearing black leather clothing and sunglasses. They recognised him straight away.

"Bl-Black Jack!" they cried in a frightened tone.

"When you pick on people that way, you disrespect me and the way people want to live," Black Jack said. "And I have no tolerance for bullies, especially when they pick on my niece."

The bullies realised that they were picking Black Jack's niece. They started saying their excuses as they backed away from him.

"Oh, we didn't know that she was your niece!"

"Of course we didn't! I mean we wouldn't bully Black Jack's niece!"

"And we won't pick on another little girl again, ever! Honest!"

"Hold it right there!" Black Jack said stopping them from running away. "You boys weren't thinking of getting away that easily, were you?"

The bullies stopped and gulped. "Let me show you how it feels like to be bullied," said Black Jack, as his eyes widened like an evil maniac. "I'm challenging all of you to a pokemon battle, here and now!"

"Huh?" said the boys in a surprised tone.

"With one condition, you three must use all of your pokemon you have on you, while I use all of mine."

The bullies gathered round each other and whispered to each other. Soon, the boys looked at Black Jack bravely. "Fine," said one of the boys. "But we're warning you, you're setting yourself up for a fall."

They took out all of their pokeballs and tossed them out. They only had three pokemon each and they were a fluffy bug ball known as Venonat, a red lizard called Charmeleon, a purple floating ball with poisonous gas coming out from different parts of its body called Koffing, a grey muscular human-like creature known as Machoke, an insect pokemon Beedrill, a boxing pokemon called Hitmonchan, a vicious bird called Spearow, a cactus-like pokemon called Cacnea, and a blackbird called Murkrow.

After they have shown their pokemon, Black Jack's face turned from a serious frown into a maniacal smile. "Only three pokemon each?" he said. "My one pokemon can take you all out, but I don't want the others to miss the fun.

He tossed all of his six pokemon, which were Tyranitar, Feraligatr, Nidoking, Metagross, Salamence and Blaziken. The bullies and their pokemon looked at them with fear in their eyes. "C'mon, you guys," said one of them. "We can beat them, there's nine of our pokemon altogether and only six of them."

"As far as I'm concerned, you're all outnumbered," Black Jack replied. "Get 'em!"

All of Black Jack's pokemon ran at the scared pokemon of the bullies and beaten them with ease. Seeing all damage that Black Jack's pokemon caused, the bullies fell on their backside and started shaking in fear.

"That will do, you little brats," Black Jack said smugly as he and his pokemon walked passed them. "That will do."

"Are you okay?" the girl asked in a worried tone.

"Yeah, I'm okay," the boy replied, even though he felt a small jolt of pain when he tried to get up. "Ow!"

Black Jack and his pokemon walked over to them and handed the candy bar back to her. "Thanks for helping my niece out, kid," Black Jack said to the boy. "From the looks of you, you are a tough little hombre, just like me."

The boy looked up at Black Jack and gasped. He was actually meeting Black Jack in person. "Thanks, Mr. Black Jack," he said.

"What's your name, kid?"

"Keith. Keith Marsden."

With that reply, Black Jack showed a small smile.

-End Flashback-

"I remember now," Keith said, offering to shake her hand. "Nice to see you again."

"Same here," Alice said as she accepted the offer. As they touched, they felt a jolt of electricity flowing through them. There was an awkward silence between them when suddenly…

"Hey! What happened here?" yelled a man's voice. Keith and Alice turned their attention towards a man who yelled. It turned out to be Black Jack running into the scene, carrying a paper bag full of food for lunch. "I heard a gunshot," he said. "Alice, are okay?"

"I'm fine, uncle," Alice replied, in an assuring tone. "Thanks to this guy."

Black Jack turned his attention to Keith and it took a short second to recognise him. "Hey, you're the kid who helped my niece out five years ago," he said. "How are things, kiddo?"

"Nothing much," Keith replied with a forced smile on his face. "Just have a few battles here and there, living my own life, that kind of thing."

"Not taking part in leagues, I see."

"Well, let's just say I like to remain anonymous."

As Black Jack turned his attention back to Alice, he noticed the mess on the floor and realised that it must the groceries that she dropped. "Man! Not my beer," Black Jack moaned when he saw spilt alcohol and smashed beer bottles on the floor.

"Shoot! Sorry about that," Keith said apologetically. "I must've made her drop some of the goods when I saved her from those criminals."

"Did you know what they look like?" Black Jack asked as he and the others crouched down to pick the goods that weren't broken.

"They kinda looked like pirates, uncle," Alice replied, feeling suspicious about the criminals. "I think we might've seen or met them before…"

"I think you might be right there," Black Jack replied, also feeling suspicious.

Keith remained silent as he listened intently to the conversation between his new acquaintances. As he listened, he was about to pick up one of the last items, which was a banana, but another hand grabbed it first and he accidentally touched the hand. He looked at the hand's owner and saw that Alice was the one getting the fruit.

He slightly blushed and quickly took his hand away from hers as Alice picked the banana. "Sorry," he said shyly.

"That's okay," Alice said, placing the banana back into the grocery bag.

"Okay, that's the last," Black Jack said, placing the last unharmed object in the bag. "Let's back to Jerry… I bet Feraligatr's picking on him as usual."

Keith noticed that Black Jack didn't see the 'touching' moment between him and Alice and wondered what would happen if he did see it. "Thanks for helping us out," Black Jack said as he and his niece began to walk away with their goods. "See you around."

"Alice, wait a second," Keith said, catching their attention. They waited for some time to listen to what he wanted to say. Keith breathed in and out, trying to calm his nerves before he could talk…

Meanwhile, back at the park, Feraligatr was finishing off drawing various scribbles on Jerry's face, using the Jigglypuff's marker pen while his friends were trying hard to not laugh to wake Jerry up.

"(There)," Feraligatr said as he gave Jigglypuff her pen back.

"(Nice pictures there)," Jigglyuff commented while nodding and giggling. "(Can I sing you a song now?)"

"(Yeah, about that…)" Feraligatr growled awkwardly. He quickly kicked the balloon pokemon up into the air while she cried until she got out of sight.

"(Feraligatr)!" Tyranitar snarled loudly as he didn't like what he saw. "(That was unnecessary)!"

"Hmm?" Jerry mumbled as he woke up to the green dinosaur's loud voice. "What's going on here?"

As he got up to his feet, he found Black Jack, Alice and the pokemon looking at him in the face. Most of them started laughing at him while others held back. "What's so funny?" Jerry asked being puzzled.

"Nothing," Black Jack replied while holding back the eagerness to laugh. "Just don't look in the mirror."

That left Jerry in a puzzled state as he scratched his head. "And don't eat a banana while you're doing that," Black Jack said, confusing Jerry even more.
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